Quotes of the day

posted at 10:01 pm on December 6, 2012 by Erika Johnsen

House Speaker John Boehner is under pressure to defy Republican Party orthodoxy on income taxes to rein in the U.S. deficit, with an increasing number of his rank- and-file members saying they’re willing to discuss raising rates for top earners.

A few dozen Republicans have joined a bipartisan call to consider “all options” on taxes and entitlement programs, signaling they are ready to bargain on President Barack Obama’s main condition for a budget deal this month: a tax rate increase for the top 2 percent of U.S. earners.

“We’re at a fork in the road,” said former New Hampshire Senator Judd Gregg, a Republican. Obama and Boehner need to realize “they have to get in a room and work out a deal,” he said, or positions will “start to harden and both sides to some degree are going to be willing to accept going over the cliff.”

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The adage in Washington is that if nobody is talking about what they’re really talking about, that’s a good sign for getting a deal.

In what may be just such a positive sign, President Barack Obama, Speaker John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, and their aides on Thursday seemed to be zipping their lips on the behind-the-scenes fiscal cliff talks after a private Wednesday phone call between the two men. Of course, both sides also continued their public relations fight over debt and taxes.

Consider the Grand Bargain negotiating track. After laughing at President Obama’s offer, Republicans made a counteroffer, of sorts, the other day. One problem with the budget plan put forward by John Boehner is that it’s not a plan, just a sketchy bunch of topline numbers that doesn’t do any of the work of explaining where the higher revenue or lower spending will actually come from. Another problem is that even the sketchy outline has provoked howls of outrage from the right and probably couldn’t pass the House, even without putting any meat on its bones.

Right now, he is hoping to lead his fractious GOP to an orderly surrender. The question is no longer whether Republicans will give on taxes; they already have. All that remains to be negotiated is how they will increase taxes, and whether they will do it before or after the government reaches the “fiscal cliff.” …

Earlier in the week, Boehner offered Obama an $800 billion tax increase with the blessing of Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, the Republicans’ vice-presidential nominee this year, and other House leaders. The speaker is trying to hold out for making those hikes come from fewer deductions rather than higher rates, but the White House is feeling so confident that it dismissed Boehner’s offer out of hand. Obama communications director Dan Pfeiffer told Peter Baker of the New York Times that Obama “won’t sign a deal that doesn’t have higher rates for the wealthy. Until they cross that bridge, nothing else is relevant.”

Republicans are looking for face-saving ways to retreat, such as allowing a tax increase to pass the House by voting “present” instead of “no.” Jeb Hensarling (Tex.), the outgoing chairman of the House GOP conference, acknowledged Wednesday on CNN that “the president is going to get his revenue one way or the other.”

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SEN. RAND PAUL: I have yet another thought on how we can fix this. Why don’t we let the Democrats pass whatever they want? If they are the party of higher taxes, all the Republicans vote present and let the Democrats raise taxes as high as they want to raise them, let Democrats in the Senate raise taxes, let the president sign it and then make them own the tax increase. And when the economy stalls, when the economy sputters, when people lose their jobs, they know which party to blame, the party of high taxes. Let’s don’t be the party of just almost as high taxes. …I will announce tonight on your show that I will work with Harry Reid to let him pass his big old tax hike with a simple majority if that’s what Harry Reid wants, because then they will become the party of high taxes and they can own it.

Carney: We know that, and the filibuster is certainly an issue here, that we don’t have 60 votes in the Senate. So, I would not argue with the idea that the President’s proposal cannot at this time, or has not at this time, garnered Republican support. That’s what this debate is about. We are very confident that the Democrats support the principle that we need to have $1.6 trillion in revenue, asking the wealthy to pay more as part of a balanced package that the President has put forward. I understand that you’re going along with the gamesmanship here. We’re trying to be serious about these negotiations. We have put forward a proposal. We have seen no substantive proposal, especially on revenues, from the Republicans.

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Let’s understand President Obama’s strategy in the “fiscal cliff” negotiations. It has nothing to do with economics or real fiscal reform. This is entirely about politics. It’s Phase Two of the 2012 campaign. The election returned him to office. The fiscal-cliff negotiations are designed to break the Republican opposition and grant him political supremacy, something he thinks he earned with his landslide 2.8-point victory margin on Election Day. …

What’s going on here? Having taken Boehner’s sword, and then his shirt, Obama sent Geithner to demand Boehner’s trousers. Perhaps this is what Obama means by a balanced approach. …

Such nonsense abounds because Obama’s objective in these negotiations is not economic but political: not to solve the debt crisis but to fracture the Republican majority in the House. Get Boehner to cave, pass the tax hike with Democratic votes provided by Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and let the Republican civil war begin.

All sides, even the parties excluded, say clearing the negotiating room improves the chance of success. It adds complexity as the two negotiators consult separately with the leaders not in the room. But it also minimizes the number of people who need to say yes to an initial agreement.

“This is now the speaker and the president working this through,” said Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the Senate’s No. 2 Democrat.

White House aides and the speaker’s staff, by mutual agreement, have largely shut down public communication about the talks to avert hundreds of billions of dollars in automatic tax increases and spending cuts set to begin in January if no deal can be reached. Both sides said on Thursday that lines of communication remained open.

NEW YORK (AP) — Ed Henry’s assignment covering the White House would be a challenge for any journalist, no matter his employer.

Yet Henry works at Fox News Channel, home base for viewers who longed for President Barack Obama’s defeat

More than anyone, he understands how the natural adversarial role of reporting on the highest level of government has become complicated in recent years by the rise in partisan media and online critics who parse every word reporters and anchors say.

“It definitely puts pressure on all of us,” Henry said, “and if you step out and ask tough questions, you’re somehow seen as a partisan now — even if it’s a substantive question and even if it’s a fair question.”

Henry, 41, is preparing for four more years on the beat and would like to cover the Obama administration from beginning to end. He came to Fox in 2011 from CNN, for whom he had worked in Washington since 2004 (his wife, Shirley Hung, is a CNN producer). Prior to getting into television, the Queens, N.Y., native worked in print at Roll Call.

He said he brings to his coverage the desire to hold public officials of each party accountable for their actions, and no ideological point of view.

Fox has never denied that prime-time stars like Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity are opinionated. Daytime hours and programs hosted by Shepard Smith and Bret Baier are set aside for news, although it’s naive to suggest there’s no point of view.(More…)
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We are not rich by any means , but 10 years back when the cap was about $95K, that extra money at the end of the year sure helped us pay for our in-state college tuition for our sons. The fall tuition was due on September 1 and the spring tuition was due on January 1. We only had 4 months to collect the spring tuition money, and that’s when we had a little extra money because of that cap.

I liked the book better than the movie, but both were very good! Also, thanks for the morning update! Every time I watch the Egypt live stream they are standing around doing nothing, but it’s still interesting. And poor Japan.

The fall tuition was due on September 1 and the spring tuition was due on January 1. We only had 4 months to collect the spring tuition money, and that’s when we had a little extra money because of that cap.

Heaven forbid anyone should get the benefit of their own money.

esr1951 on December 7, 2012 at 7:55 AM

Or your son could have taken out a loan for part of the tuition or done what many working class students do, gotten a work-study job. Or done as I did and got an academic scholarship. The point is that no one is saying that there won’t be sacrifices to keep money flowing to retirees. But its better for society as a whole.

The alternative is to make families financially responsible for retirees, then those issues around “fall tuition” still become an issue.

And yes, they did have scholarships. They did have summer jobs. We preferred to pay for our own family and not ask anyone, including our fellow citizens , for help. Our sons have thanked us many times for the fact that they can now start their lives without debt.

And let me also mention, they we live very frugally. We have always purchased used cars, gone many years without new clothes, etc. So please do not tell my how to manage my own finances.

And let me also mention, they we live very frugally. We have always purchased used cars, gone many years without new clothes, etc. So please do not tell my how to manage my own finances.

esr1951 on December 7, 2012 at 8:36 AM

I know, I know. This may be the fundamental difference between liberals and conservatives.

esr1951 on December 7, 2012 at 8:52 AM

Leftists always believe they know best, any evidence to the contrary be damned!

I, like you, am a fiscally responsible person who happily can and does live within a reasonable budget – clueless leftists like 0dumba are too stupid to understand and implement the wisdom of such a mentality, and are the type of people who deserve the blame for Greece’s economic problems.

Upthread, someone said that Marxists aren’t morons, which, when considering that they personify the Dunning-Kruger effect, is a ridiculous statement.

I am with Sen. Rand Paul. We all know (at least those that are not hard core Democrats) that the impact of the tax increase on those earning over 250K on the national debt will be similar to that of a little boy peeing in the ocean. However, the GOP has an image problem – event though Obama has been a miserable failure and made a bad situation much worse, he has had a pretty easy time of avoiding any responsibility, and the media and much of the voting public are letting him get away with it.

Raising taxes on those making over $250K will not do much good; conversely there are so many things wrong with our financial situation that NOT raising taxes on this group probably will not do much good either.

Let Obama have his tax increase – then let the GOP announce clearly that they compromised for the good of the nation but did not want nor agree with the tax increase. As Sen Paul says, let Obama own it and have to accept responsibility for something for the 1st time during his tenure. There are few signs of upcoming improvements in our economy – let go of this relatively minor skirmish and st sights on the bigger battle in the 2014 Congressional elections – this strategy could pay off big them.